Chapter 6. Making and Moving the Oars

In the last chapter, you put your knowledge of building objects to a practical use as well as what you knew of how to use the 3D View. You made a small boat and added textures, and then explored different ways of lighting.

In this chapter you will expand on your modeling skills and what you have learned about animation to take things to the next level. You'll learn some cool modeling techniques, and animate the boat and the oars.

You will explore:

• Creating oars and oarlocks to move the boat

• Controlling the smoothness of a surface

• Appending objects to the scene to reuse previously made objects

• Creating child-parent relationships, to group objects for animation

• Using kinematics to organize animation

• Employing animation cycles to save work

• Using camera tracking to follow the boat's motion

Let's start by making the oar.